A Pair Of 17-Year-Old Snowboarders Won Gold Medals For USA But One Almost Missed His Event!

Do you remember what you were doing when you were 17? There’s a good possibility you weren’t on the other side of the world competing in the Winter Olympics.However, that’s what two 17-year-old American snowboarders were doing this week and the duo definitely made their country proud!

A post shared by redgerard (@redgerard) on Jan 20, 2018 at 10:50pm PST

17-year-old American snowboarder Red Gerard is making history with his February – that, and binge-watching Netflix. In fact, Red was up so late watching Brooklyn Nine-Nine on Saturday, he slept through his alarm.

Sleeping through your alarm when you’re 17 usually just results in you being late for school, but the consequences for Red were a little more important for Red: Sunday was the day of his event, slopestyle.

The teen, who was looking to defend Team USA’s gold at the inaugural event in Sochi, botched his first run. During his second, it looked like Red tweaked his back, which led the broadcast crew to question if he’d be 100-percent for the third and final run.

Red nailed it with an 87.16 to put him ahead of the two Canadian favorites, Max Parrot and Mark McMorris, who finished with the silver and bronze, respectively.

Red’s gold medal was the USA’s first in the Pyeongchang Games and he became the youngest snowboarder to win a medal at the Winter Olympics.